


Like A Bird

by purple_is_great



Series: Nursey Week 2021 [5]
Category: Check Please! (Webcomic)
Genre: Ballet, Gen, Hobbies, Hockey, Nursey Week, Nursey Week 2021, Pre-Canon, mentions of bullying
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-12
Updated: 2021-02-12
Packaged: 2021-03-12 01:27:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 744
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29377098
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/purple_is_great/pseuds/purple_is_great
Summary: Derek was doing ballet before he even got on the ice, but he loved both ballet and hockey.
Relationships: Derek "Nursey" Nurse & Derek "Nursey" Nurse's mother
Series: Nursey Week 2021 [5]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2150895
Kudos: 7





	Like A Bird

**Author's Note:**

> Written for day 5 of Nursey Week 2021, Hobbies & Hockey
> 
> find me on tumblr at [prepnursey](https://prepnursey.tumblr.com/)

Derek’s trying to be very quiet, but the wooden floor creaks right as he’s stepping into the studio. Mama turns her head from where she’s practicing at the rail – a barre, he remembers it’s called.

“Hello, dear. Did you finish your homework already?”

“Yep. It was boring. I already know how to write, and we’re just practicing letter shapes,” Derek pouts, leaning on the doorway. 

Mama laughs fondly. “Well, I’m glad to hear you got it done anyway. Did you just want to tell me that, or is there something else on your mind?”

Derek shuffles his feet, suddenly nervous. “Uhh, Mama? Can you show me how to dance pretty like you do?”

“You want to do ballet?” Mama asks, lowering her leg from the barre and turning wholly to face him.

“Yeah! We went to see some last week with the class, and I remembered that you always said it’s really fun.”

“That’s right; I really love ballet.” Mama sits on the floor and beckons Derek to join him. When Derek settles in her lap, Mama strokes his cheek and continues: “I love ballet, and if you want to try it out, I can call my ballet instructor to ask about their children’s classes.”

On his first lesson Derek is completely enamoured by the magic of ballet. On the dance floor he feels free and weightless, and like no one can touch him. He’s always been clumsy, but in his dance clothes he feels like a soaring bird.

Derek loves ballet, which is difficult to understand for some people. When he’s eleven, he comes home from school crying after his classmates found out he dances ballet. Mama holds him and soothes him until he falls asleep in her lap. She doesn’t say it then, and Derek only finds out when he is seventeen that she’d been biting her tongue when he wanted to start ballet, not wanting to scare him off, but wanting to keep her child safe. The boys at school mocking him don’t make him quit ballet; no. They make him want to continue even more. Mama smiles a sad smile and calls him her little fighter. He objects, saying that he is already eleven and almost as tall as his older sister, that he is her big fighter. That makes Mama laugh, and Derek quietly breathes a sigh of relief that he isn’t hurting her by continuing ballet.

_X_

He starts hockey when he’s seven. His Mom played when she was young, and the first time she takes Derek and Farrah skating, Derek falls in love with the cool ice and the swish of the blades, even if he does fall down at least ten times. But Mom just lifts him up, and in the end almost has to carry him off the ice. They go to an Islanders game the following weekend, and Derek’s barely out of the arena before he’s jumping up and down in excitement, trying to convince Mom and Mama to let him try it out. 

They’re worried for him, of course they are. Hockey’s dangerous, in his first game playing defence, a puck hits him in the face, rattling the full cage mask they make the kids wear. Derek just grins and says it was really exciting, that all the boys on the team thought it was really cool. 

It isn’t until later that Derek realises his parents weren’t really worried about the physical pain. On his first team, the kids are too small to be really mean about anything, and their coaches keep a tight watch on what the kids are chirping each other about. 

On the later teams, well, Derek learns fast to not tell them about his friends from ballet class. It sucks, sometimes, but all the mean words and unnecessary shoves from opposing teams are all worth it. He can take them, because it means he gets to be on the ice. He feels weightless and free, but also immensely rooted to the moment. Even if they aren’t the best of friends outside the ice, on it he knows he can trust all the boys on his team. On the ice he feels like a bird too, but not a soaring one, flying freely. No, he feels like a hawk, plunging after a target, or a fierce eagle protecting its nest. This is where Derek belongs. On the ice, with a stick in his hand and a D-partner at his side. 


End file.
